


Bittersweet Severance

by sleepingseeker



Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TV 2012), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, F/M, Regret
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-08
Updated: 2015-02-08
Packaged: 2018-03-11 00:33:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3309053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleepingseeker/pseuds/sleepingseeker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Raphael wants to drown out his regrets. Karai keeps them fresh in his mind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bittersweet Severance

**Author's Note:**

> Here's a little piece I just wrote, just 'cuz FFN is on the fritz and my jaw is hurting and my heart is hurtin' and here, let me take it out on Karai and Raph.
> 
> Set in the far future of the 2k12 series - when some things have settled and others never can.

 

The candle sputtered, guttering in the concave pool. The flame, weakened, but still alight, cast a flickering amber glow over his face. 

"Leave me be," he grumbled. 

Between his hands, a bottle - brown and near-empty. The light caught along the rim as he raised it to his lips. One eye peering out to the side as his throat worked, swallowing the last of the bitter liquor. 

She emerged from the surrounding darkness. With careful steps, she navigated the broken planks, crumbling cinder blocks and other debris that littered the short expanse dividing them. He wouldn't look at her, despite being close enough for him to reach out and fondle, had he wanted to, or punch, which he did. But he remained, slumped in place, staring with grim interest in the now-empty bottle.

"I came to say I'm s-"

With a lurch, he bolted upright, knocking the chair back to crash to the floor. The candle tipped. The flame went out as a spreading pool of melted wax oozed across the splintered surface. He reared back and launched the bottle against the far wall. It exploded in a mighty crash of brown glass and tattered paper. He turned his face and stared at her, through the darkness. 

Her dark eyes gazed back, solemn and luminous. Jaw working, he opened his mouth to say something, but lost the thread of it as he caught the remorse, the sorrow, written in their depths. 

He closed his eyes, felt the temper, his old companion and everlasting vice, ebb. With his chest heaving, he wheeled away in the opposite direction from whence she came, waving his hand generally through the air. 

"Save your breath."

Stubborn as she ever was, she chased after him. She reached out and snatched at the coat he wore by his shoulder. 

Acting on an instinct honed for too many decades to count, he gripped her wrist and rolled forward, effectively flipping her over his shell onto the floor before him. He leaped onto her, straddling her and raised one fist - knuckles scarred doubly over, swollen and arthritic, but no less dangerous.

Breathless, and fearless, as ever, she stared up with wide, but defiant eyes. 

Raphael pulled back a bit more, jaw working, teeth grinding. His fist trembled. His body shook.

"Do it," she commanded.

"I should," he ground out, and his fist trembled harder, tightening further. Eyes wild and wide. Gleaming with hatred.  _"I should!"_

Her eyes locked on his; her chin jutted out, and despite the white of her hair, the lines near her mouth, she was just as defiant as she had ever been in her youth.

And just as beautiful.

Deadly as a snake, beguiling as a sorceress. 

No wonder he fell. There was never any real doubt, not really, in Raphael's opinion, as far as Karai's attraction went. She was incredibly hot. Leonardo would have been a fool not to fall for this woman, made of grace and death and lust and fire. 

It wasn't just her looks, wild and untamed; not just her skill, sharp and deadly as any of their own; but her fierce attitude, her fearless grip she had on life. 

The lust of life ran hot in her blood. As it did his. 

Once.

But that was a long time ago. He was not what he once was. He was no longer what could be roughly construed a hero. Raphael huffed and dropped his fist. 

If he'd ever been that, it was a joke. A parody on honor and respect. On loyalty. All the things he held so dear, all the brittle sorry little lies of a life that amounted to nothing but secrets and back-door dealings. 

If he'd ever been anything good, it was those few years lost between the innocence of childhood and the awkward awakening into adolescence. From there, it had been nothing but one long swan dive.

He rolled off her and gripped his head in both hands.

And there were too many regrets to cut a path back towards anything that might resemble redemption. Remorse ate a hole in his heart that no deed, no word, not even the bittersweet severance of death could fill.

"If I ever see you again, Karai," he warned, voice a muttered mass of gravel. Broken glass like broken promises. Digging in deep and deeper yet. "I swear to god. Stay the fuck away from me."

She rose and offered her hand to him. "We both know that is not a promise," she sighed and coughed, "either of us can make."

He glanced at her proffered hand with a watering eye and tried to sneer, but it came out more of a pained grimace.

With another sigh, she bent and took his arm, still bulky with muscle undefined, but lingering, with two hands; lifting him unsteadily to his feet. He shrugged out of her hold and growled, but it was a weak sound. Watered down with age and exhaustion. 

She stepped back and dusted herself off. Ignoring him. She sniffed once. The only indication of emotion he'd see from her, tonight. That is, if he got away from her without anything else happening between them. It was not a sure thing. Given their history.

Still breathing heavy from being tossed. She gave him a sidelong glance, then twisted to look back into the remnants of his kitchen. Several bottles lay scattered about and overturned.

"I see you are out," she caught her breath, "of liquor."

He kept his narrowed gaze on her, face turned down, still grimacing at the ache in his body. But ignoring the worn-in, familiar ache in his heart.

"Why do you keep doin' this to yourself?" he asked. Then added, softer, voice thick with emotion, eyes sweeping away, unable to look at her as he said, "To me?"

Ignoring him, she went on. "Allow me to remedy that," she motioned with her head and started towards the front of the basement apartment's door; leaning diagonally on its frame. She shoved it aside and left into the night, leaving it open behind her.

Raph shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his coat. He hesitated only a moment before following. Keeping in her shadow until he got into her car.

Outside, the rain pattered in a gentle pattern. It pooled in shimmering miniature ponds along the cracked sidewalk and pitted asphalt. Filling in the gaps temporarily. Reflecting the darkness within and without.


End file.
